And Here's Another Way It Could Happen
by BooksCatsEtc
Summary: Altho I loved the job James Frain did as Batshit Franklin, I felt making Franklin crazy limited the character too much. So I rewrote the Tara/Franklin story to suit myself.
1. From Parking Lot to Cheap Motel

_(note: I own nothing and only play with toys Alan Ball owns. While I have done my best to keep from being too descriptive here, a certain amount of questionable talk was necessary given the circumstances and Tara's normal mode of expressing herself. Please keep that in mind if you decide to read the story.)_

**From Parking Lot to Cheap Motel**

**(or, What Franklin Learned in Tibet)**

He was looking at me with eyes glazed over from lust. It wasn't an expression I was used to seeing after giving in to violent impulses in public. I wasn't thinking that at the time, of course - I wasn't thinking anything much at all except "He's here. He's willing.", and having the general idea he could do something about all the adrenaline throbbing through me.

I stepped over the pulpy redneck on the ground, grabbed Brit Vamp's black shirt and kissed him, long and hard. He responded, and every nerve ending I had exploded. It was . . . different . . . kissing a guy with rattlesnake fangs, but I was so wound up I'd have jumped him if he'd had walrus tusks.

I tried to rip his shirt off, but it was made out of some stretchy material and I finally just jerked it over his head. When his arms came down he grabbed me hard around the waist, lifted me up and walked to a nearby car. As often as I'd thought how creepy a vampire's cold body would be, I was actually enjoying his coolness against my over-heated skin.

There was a thump as my back hit the passenger side door, and he fumbled around in his pocket for the keys while our lips were still locked together. My blood at full boil, I started rubbing my crotch against his and he got my jeans and panties off with stunning speed and we took each other braced against the car.

It only lasted a couple of minutes and that was all I needed but far from all I wanted. Apparently not all Brit Vamp wanted either. He opened the passenger door, pushed me in and tossed my jeans to me. I don't know what happened to the panties; somebody found a souvenir that night.

By the time he got in the driver's side, I had my jeans back on, more or less. As he pulled out of Merlotte's parking lot I tugged his zipper down and got at him with my mouth. It wasn't something I did a lot, but the way I felt right then, it was fuck or die.

It wasn't long before he was parking in front of a cheap motel and, pushing my mouth off him, he flipped me over, getting my jeans off again in the process. He was inside me before I could draw my next breath, and when I did the noise that came out was a deep, animal groan. I braced myself in the awkward front seat, wrapped my legs around his waist and met his thrusts with rabid eagerness.

He came a few seconds after me, got his clothes together and backed out of the car. Finding one leg of my jeans still on, I scrambled to get back into them properly before he opened the door on my side, picked me up out of the seat and carried me into his motel room.

We made it as far as the rug in front of the door before we were fucking again. By this time my blood was finally starting to drop slowly from full boil to it's usual steady simmer, so I was able to consider things like bad rug burn and switch over to the bed before I lost an entire layer of skin.

The session on the bed ended with me riding him long and slow to an orgasm so noisy I bit into his shoulder to keep the manager from throwing us out. Had I been completely back in my right mind, I would have never bitten a vampire under any circumstances but at the time his shoulder was right here and looked more sound absorbent than a thin motel pillow.

I don't think he minded it, really. His arms tightened around me hard enough to leave bruises, and when he came he snarled something I couldn't understand in a language I don't think was English. At least, not the English I spoke. But he kissed my neck and shoulders gently while I was getting my breath back, and I noticed that bite marks I'd made had completely healed, leaving only a smear of his blood behind on his skin.

He waved a hand at me dreamily when I asked to use the shower, and I wobbled into the dingy little bathroom with its tiny shower stall. I was nearly finished by the time he joined me, first knelling on the tiles with his face between my legs and his tongue as fast as a vibrator (or so I've heard), then pressing me to the shower wall where we fucked with my legs around his waist until the water turned too cold for me to stand.

I moaned happily and sagged boneless in his arms while he turned the water off.

"Have a good time?", he asked in his wonderful accent.

"Oh man, " I sighed, "this is the first time I've _ever_ been able to fuck as much as I've wanted to!"

He laughed, and took me back to the bed. I told him I was too tired to fuck anymore but he said he had something special in mind that he thought I'd like, something he'd learned in Tibet, and I wouldn't have to move a muscle.

_Why the hell not? _I thought. _I've enjoyed everything else we've done together._

He was serious about the not moving; once he'd entered me we were both motionless, staring into each others eyes. It felt silly at first, and then the damnedest thing happened. I could feel him in me, from both our sides of it. While I was getting over that surprise, I realized I could also feel a cool breeze from the window touching his back and I knew, without doubt, that he could feel the drop of water moving down my side.

I've never been into that kumbaya-we-are-all-one crap, but it was actually happening. I lost all sense of myself as an individual, as separate and distinct. And it was more than feeling one with him - I'd lost all sense of being separate from the room we were in, from the little bug crawling along the baseboard, from the trees outside, even from all the damn stars in the sky.

It was amazing, and scary, and powerful. Everything was a swirling flood of the most astonishing sensations, and then everything started to come, or at least that's how it seemed. We were all levitating, rising up as an indescribable ecstasy roared through this borderless vastness, making it all light up before we sank down again and I went back to being just individual me.

Back to myself in time to see his eyes close in blissful anticipation as his jaw dropped open, leaving his fangs fully bared. I knew that look, I'd had it on my own face before biting into a favorite food.

And I told him to go ahead, to just fucking do it. I mean, damn, it was kind of his turn anyway even if I didn't relish the whole becoming a snack experience.

But he didn't do it; it cost him something to stop but he pulled back and told me no, he wouldn't do it because I wanted him to. I didn't care for the sound of that, but before I could ask him exactly what that meant he'd flipped me tail over toes at high speed and entered the last unexplored opening I had left.

And I thanked whatever powers there were for men who knew how to use their dicks and let him give us both a good time. Better than I expected, in fact, and we were feeling loose and talkative afterwards. He was honest enough to admit that the mind-blowing sex was a vampire thing - something to do with supernatural stamina, I'd guess - and not a personal gift. If he hadn't unwittingly reminded me of Eggs, and that whole damned Maryanne mess, I don't know how long I would have stayed in his bed.


	2. From Bon Temps to Jackson

**And Here's Another Way It Could Happen . . .**

_(note: I own nothing and only play with toys Alan Ball owns. My aim in these stories is to provide an alternative to Batshit Franklin, so bear in mind that what you've got here is all Original Franklin, all the time. That means I diverge wildly from the show for the most part altho I will sneak back to steal a few things every now and then. My earlier stand-alone story, From Parking Lot to Cheap Motel, can be considered a prelude to this story.)_

**Chapter One: from Bon Temps to Jackson**

A short knock at the door brought her quickly, the dismayed look on her face assured me I wasn't who she'd been hoping for. Who was the lucky bastard?, I wondered. If I'd been staying in this swamp of a town, I'd settle things by eating my competition, but I had nearly everything I needed to complete my investigation and expected to be gone tonight. Damn shame, I thought, eyeing the view in the doorway. Still, no reason not to have some fun.

"Good evening . . . Tara."

"Who told you my name?" Like I couldn't have gotten it in half a dozen places in a town this size.

"I met a delightful baby vampire . . . "

And we were off. As entertaining as our bantering was, though, I had a job to do and I needed to put my girl under soon. There are two ways to glamour: the easiest and most used (overused, in my opinion) is with the eyes. If a vampire has any ability to glamour at all, that'll work. The other is the voice, though it takes longer and requires a finer touch. I started out using my voice, since that was my specialty, but either I'm getting weak in my old age or she was much stronger willed than the average human because she resisted me for several minutes.

If I weren't on a schedule, I would have been delighted to continue the contest - it was clear she could feel my influence, but still she was giving me sass! 'That girl from Bon Temps', indeed. I had to rely on the old stand-by of my piercing eyes coupled with my voice to get her to let me in and, although it went well at first, as soon as I began to question her she was struggling to break my hold. It was truly remarkable.

I tried to calm her with a little flirtation, but she was having none of it, and as soon as my concentration flickered for an instant she broke free and ran for the door. I spared a split second for amused appreciation (most humans could only dream of having a will that strong) before cutting off her escape.

More blah, blah, blah about her friend Sookie, the same friend who'd left her in a house surrounded by hunting werewolves (oh yeah, I knew about that and even if I hadn't I'd have smelled them all around the place) without a single word of warning, leaving Tara perfectly positioned to become another of life's innocent bystanders. That was when I decided to take her with me when I left and, since it was clear listening to reason from a vampire wasn't on Tara's agenda, I did what I had to do to get her out of there.

I bit her. It would mark her as "mine" with any other vampires we happened to meet, and by feeding on her just enough I could both knock her out for awhile and get my first decent meal after several nights of making do with that vile fake blood drink. I grinned as I hoisted her inert body over my shoulder and thought of how I'd be hearing about all my transgressions as soon as she regained consciousness. I looked forward to it.

Tara shook herself awake in the car, stared at me, then at the dark road with a sign reading "Jackson, 150 miles" before putting a hand to the raw bite wounds on her neck.

"You bastard," she said coldly.

"Now, now," I answered, "no call to be unpleasant, I have my reasons for everything."

"You don't consider biting someone and kidnapping them a 'call' to be unpleasant? You turn this car around and take me home right now, you motherfucker, or so help me I will stake you the first chance I get!"

"This isn't kidnapping . . . well, technically it is, but like I said I have my reasons. Give me 10 minutes to explain and, if you still want to go back to the swamp, I'll turn the car around. Otherwise, you get a road trip to Mississippi for the weekend, a stay at my apartment, and a chance to spend the day sneaking around looking for your friend Sookie before I take you home. Or rent you a car or buy you a bus ticket, whichever you prefer."

"I'm not giving you anything! Asshole! You _glamoured_ me and don't lie about it because I can remember it. I hate that. You glamoured me, and used me, and bit me and now you're kidnapping me! How dare you? How dare you treat me this way?"

I shrugged, and said the wrong thing. "I like your company."

I had no idea humans could move that fast. Her fist nearly connected with my face before I caught it, and I had to pull the car over to avoid crashing as she lunged at me across the front seat, apparently intending to tear my head off. Not for the first time I considered what an excellent vampire she'd make.

Then I realized, in the midst of all the flailing and high-pitched obscenities, that she was crying. She couldn't have possibly done anything that shocked me more. I got my arms around her, not without difficulty, and held on while she struggled and yelled incoherently about what an asshole son of a bitch I was, her bitch mother and somebody named Maryanne. Finally, she stopped struggling and then stopped crying and slowly the story came out as we sat there parked on the side of the road with traffic speeding by.

It's just as well I'll probably never meet her mother - however bad their relationship, I doubt Tara would thank me for ripping Lettie Mae's lungs out. The Maryanne story called for some thought, but I could see where Tara's intense reaction to being glamoured came from. Between her mother and the maenad, she'd been stripped of her free will enough for several lifetimes without my adding to it.

Giving silent thanks that no other vampire was around to hear this, I promised never to glamour her again, no matter how much easier it made things for me. And I told her about the werewolves around the Stackhouse place, and yes, I could have taken her to another friend's house but I really did like her company and in my high-handed vampire way I decided to take her with me until the wolves were called off. I explained how my bite mark on her neck would discourage other vampires, and a few werewolves as well, from getting fangy with her. And that my offer to take her back now, or send her back later on her own, still stood.

She thought silently for awhile. "How can I trust you?" she asked me, a serious question.

"Listen, Tara," I told her, "I'm not a good guy, in fact most of the time I'm a right bastard. But I like you and I've never lied to you, even about the glamouring, and I like to think that counts for something."

"I need my fucking head examined," Tara sighed. "But you seem only slightly more than half bad, for a vampire, and besides, I don't have any other friends I can go to. Or at least, only a few and they have problems of their own. And Sookie's in Jackson and god knows what new trouble she needs help getting out of so I'll take a chance with you. Just leave me alone for awhile, OK?"

I pulled back onto the road and drove silently; in about 15 minutes Tara's breathing told me she'd fallen asleep, worn out by a hard night and a crying jag. We'd lost some time on her melt down and I'd have to break a few traffic laws to make it home before dawn. At least I was spared finding out if Tara was a back seat driver until a better night, and I had the quiet to consider what I knew about maenads.

According to Russell, who knew more than a little about the supernatural universe, maenads only technically qualified as supernatural beings - they were humans who became more than human by sheer force of will. They were impossible to control and so hard to kill that it was just as well to avoid them entirely.

Their now rare and demented followers could devote years of group effort and complicated, ritual acts of sex and violence without being able to call a maenad to them, but Tara had called one to her all by herself, without even trying. That was beyond impressive, and there was no way that maenad turned up in Bon Temps just to make Tara another zombie slave.

No one could ask Maryanne now, but I had no doubt at all that the strength of will that had so dazzled me had made Maryanne come to claim Tara for a protégé, not a slave. She had meant to break Tara down only so she would recognize Maryanne as a master who would then make Tara a master as well. Tara had been on her first steps to becoming a maenad, and had no idea. Would she, I wondered, have come to accept her new life as preferable to the narrow, frustrating one she now led? And I had to wonder again, should she be turned? The raw power of her will, the potential of it, would always draw super-naturals to her, eager to put it to their own uses, unless she was taught to harness and use it for herself.

Next, Chapter Two: Jackson


	3. Jackson

**And Here's Another Way It Could Happen . . .**

_(note: I own nothing and only play with toys Alan Ball owns. My aim in these stories is to provide an alternative to Batshit Franklin, so bear in mind that what you've got here is all Original Franklin, all the time. That means I diverge wildly from the show for the most part altho I will sneak back to steal a few things every now and then.)_

**Chapter Two: Jackson**

We got into Jackson barely half an hour before dawn; Franklin dropped me off at his apartment before going to report in to Edgington and spend the day there. He thought it just as well that his employer didn't know anything about me and I couldn't have agreed more.

He'd left me with a set of spare keys and $50 for groceries as he had nothing for humans in his kitchen and there was a deli on the first floor of the building and a greengrocers across the street. I expect he meant a market by that.

I pocketed the $50 and went down to the street and then wondered what the hell to do next. Sookie'd either lost her cell phone or wasn't answering my calls - probably didn't want to be on the phone if Bill called. God, I hoped that nothing-but-trouble vampire wasn't about to get my best friend sucked down to the lowest circle of Hell.

I spent the day walking around, trying to come up with a plan and hoping I didn't get lost. At one point I found myself outside the Greyhound Bus Station and considered using Franklin's money to buy a ticket home, or to anywhere at all. But fuck it, I couldn't leave not knowing how Sookie was, and part of me wanted to see Franklin again. That irritated the hell out of me, that I was sparing a thought for him at all.

I got back to his place just as the sun was going down and who should be walking across the lobby but Sookie, looking like she was wearing a Halloween skank costume and in the company of a man so huge I had to look up twice to see his face.

"Sookie?" I cried as I ran over to her, still not certain I wasn't looking at her evil twin.

"Tara! My god, what are you doing here?" We were hugging and talking over each other while the mountainoid shuffled around, looking nervous.

"I spent all day looking for you. Sookie, you need to get away from here. There's been a private investigator in Bon Temps asking questions about Bill for days, he's in some kind of serious shit and this is the epicenter of it!"

"She's telling the truth," the man mountain rumbled. "Whatever is going down, I'm sure Compton would want you out of danger."

"I'm not leaving Jackson without Bill," Sookie said stubbornly. "If he's in trouble I have to help him. He'd do the same for me. I got some new information at a werewolf biker party, we'll get together tomorrow morning and brainstorm a rescue plan. Right now I have to get this gunk off and get some rest."

Knowing there was no stopping Sookie once she was set on something, I agreed. We hugged again and she and the big guy, Alcide, got in the elevator.

Remembering I hadn't picked up any food yet, I trudged into the deli and bought a bottle of pop and a salami sandwich on a hard roll. Tomorrow I'd start eating like I was sensible. In the meantime, I went back to Franklin's apartment and, to my surprise, I found a few plates, glasses and cutlery in his kitchen.

What did he need with these? A sickening suspicion took me through the apartment looking carefully for any room that could be used as a cell, or that had any traces of a place to attach chains. Finding nothing even remotely suspicious, I returned to the kitchen and ate my dinner amid dim feelings of guilt.

Franklin got home just as I was finishing up and deliberately, I thought, did not ask me how I spent my day. Instead he announced his job for Edgington was over and in a few hours he was leaving to meet with a potential new client.

In the meantime, since I'd told him so much about my life on the drive to Jackson, he told me a little about himself. He'd been human "a fair long time ago", so long ago that he was the first turned of his boss, Russell Edgington's, progeny. He'd been born in what was now Northern England, spent his adulthood as a soldier, thief and con artist in the cities of the more civilized South and had gone home to die at 30 of what was then called "the wasting sickness".

"Tuberculosis", I translated. "So that's why . . . " I stopped, not sure how rude I wanted to be.

". . . I look like this," he finished with a sardonic grin. "People aged much faster from life's hardships back then anyway, and I was only a few days from death on top of that when Russell decided he could use a man of my skills and turned me. You look forever how you looked the day you died."

"You don't look so bad," I surprised myself by saying. "Got kind of a scruffy bad boy thing going on."

"Thanks," he replied dryly. "In any case, I've worked for Russell off and on over the centuries, less so in the last 700 years since he turned Talbot, his lover and the last of his progeny. Talbot has a jealous streak and doesn't care for any of Russell's other surviving children, me least of all. I think I clash with his décor." He shrugged. "But there's hardly any love lost. The last time we were in the same room I referred to him as the cleaning woman, and he called me a 'psycho fugly thug'. That sums up our relationship quite well."

The evening wound down after that. Franklin left to meet with his new client, and I watched TV until I fell asleep on the sofa. When I woke up in the morning, I was stretched out on it with a pillow under my head and a thick blanket covering me. Franklin was in his pitch dark bedroom, lying fully clothed on the bed, looking dead. I closed the door much more quietly than necessary and wondered if it was arrogance, trust or carelessness that made him leave it unlocked.

I went up to Alcide's apartment on the next floor and got worried when I found the door unlocked. My alarm was confirmed when I found Alcide just recovering consciousness in his kitchen. Bill had come for Sookie last night, but so had Russell Edgington and both Bill and Sookie had been taken prisoner. I felt a little sick. How much was Franklin involved in this? Had he told Edgington anything to make him want Sookie? Told him something that _I_ had told Franklin?

There was no time to fuss over all that. Sookie needed help, and with Alcide beside me there was a chance we could rescue her without dying ourselves. In minutes we were in Alcide's truck and racing to Edgington's plantation house.

It was easy enough to get in, we didn't see a single guard on the grounds, which was weird considering Alcide was certain Edgington had an army of werewolf guards. Didn't run into anybody inside the place either, until we found one guard standing alertly in front of a door. Had to be guarding either Sookie or Bill or both, we figured, and decided to go with the old standard of distract and attack.

I waltzed up to the guard and starting chatting breezily, as if we were meeting at a cocktail party. In the few seconds he wasted trying to wrap his mind around that, Alcide snuck up and knocked him out with one blow. Sometimes bigger is better.

To my joy, Sookie was the one being guarded and the three of us rushed to get out of the mansion. I was actually hoping things would go smoothly from here on when Sookie announced, at the front door, that Bill was being held in the slave quarters and she was going to go get him. I called her a few choice names but gave in as usual.

As Alcide made a run for his truck, Sookie went in to the slave quarters to get Bill while I stood watch outside. We'd finally seen a couple of "guards" on the grounds but they looked more than a little out of it so I was again hoping for little trouble. I was getting so tired of being wrong about that.

Sounds of struggle brought me into the slave quarters with Alcide, thankfully, right behind me. Unthankfully, the two guards came in right after him. The next five minutes were a horrifying confusion of screams, pointy sticks, exploding vampires and shots fired wildly. When everything finally slammed to a stop, there was bloody vampire goo all over the floor (and everyone nearby), a dead guard right beside it and Alcide and the female guard in an armed face-off. Which she won by threatening to shoot Sookie. Just as she was cackling in triumph and threatening horrible revenge on us all for "killing her Cooter", a trap-door previously hidden under dirt flew open and the she-wolf disappeared down it. I heard a sickeningly loud snap and the guard's body sailed right back out, her head at a terribly wrong angle as she landed in a heap next to the male.

When Franklin vaulted out after her, I half expected it even though it was the middle of the day. He had a few burn marks on his face and hands but otherwise looked in one piece.

"Come on," Franklin said, "the wolves are starting to pick up a clue and may even figure out how to follow the scent of blood here. There's escape tunnels dug under this place, and one leads to where I saw a truck parked. Yours, I'm guessing." This to Alcide. "The tunnels get a little tight in spots, and slimy, but we should all fit through them."

He jumped back into the tunnel and had Alcide pass the tarp-wrapped Bill Compton down to him. I went in next and between the two of us we managed to carry Compton, using the tarp as a sling. Sookie followed, nattering at us to be careful with her Bill, and Alcide brought up the rear.

It occurred to me that I hadn't even questioned whether Franklin would lead us to safety, or back to the house and Russell Edgington. That bothered me, that I trusted him. Feeling unsettled and irritable, I started hissing questions at him.

"How did you know where I was? Did you tell Edgington about Sookie? Did you send him after her? What are you up to?"

"Blood bond, yes, and no. Tara, I was working for Russell before we met. He hired me to find out why the Queen of Louisiana sent Compton to Bon Temps, and that involved finding out about Sookie Stackhouse. I'd taken Russell's money and I finished doing the job I'd agreed to do. I'm not going to apologize for that, although I am sorry you got hurt. I turned down Russell's request that I retrieve Miss Stackhouse for him, and I'll turn down other jobs that would upset you. I'm here now because I want to help you, and since that means helping Miss Stackhouse, that's what I'm doing."

I fumed in silence for awhile. I was still mad about him ratting out Sookie, and using me to do it, but the only thing I could really accuse him of was a morally ambiguous job and a strong work ethic. And he had come out in the middle of the day because I was in trouble. Which reminded me -

"How did you get here? It's noon!"

"Underground parking at the apartment and a special sun filter on the car windows. It's not a perfect solution, or a pleasant one, but it does make driving possible in the daylight if I absolutely have to. And luckily the tunnel exit I needed is in a wooded area. I got a few burns but nothing that won't heal."

We passed the rest of the trip in silence, except for Sookie's occasional questions about how Bill was doing. At the tunnel exit, Franklin stayed inside with Bill while the rest of us got out, then handed Bill up to Alcide. Sookie and Alcide got Bill into the back of the truck and raced off to the nearest hospital equipped to deal with vampire medical emergencies.

I'd told Sookie I was going to help Franklin get back home, and hugged her goodbye. I could only hope Sookie would be alright, but I knew that with Bill she had everything she wanted, and with a guy like Alcide around she had the best protection she could get. It was time for me to think seriously about my own life.

Next, Chapter Three: Jackson, and beyond


	4. Jackson, and beyond

**And Here's Another Way It Could Happen . . .**

_(note: I own nothing and only play with toys Alan Ball owns. My aim in these stories is to provide an alternative to Batshit Franklin, so bear in mind that what you've got here is all Original Franklin, all the time. That means I diverge wildly from the show for the most part altho I will sneak back to steal a few things every now and then.)_

**Chapter Three: Jackson, and beyond**

"I'm not going back to Bon Temps," Tara told me as we walked into my apartment.

"Are you going to stay here? My sofa folds out."

"Maybe for a few days." She started to strip off of her gore spattered clothes as she spoke. "I need to reboot my life, do something completely new and different. I know books, I like books, and there are little towns all over this country seriously in need of a good bookstore. I'm going to find one of those towns, open a bookstore, and start my life over from scratch. Clean slate. Speaking of which, does this building have an incinerator?"

I took her now balled up clothes and told her I'd take care of it. She nodded matter-of-factly and disappeared into the bathroom for some time. I put some clothes of mine out for her - they wouldn't fit right but she'd look adorable.

When Tara came out of the bathroom, clad in a towel, I saw why cleaning up had taken her so long - she'd cut her hair level to her earlobes and undone the braids so that her hair now poofed out around her head in a soft, dark nimbus. She looked like the spirit of a storm cloud.

I walked over to her and wound a velvety tendril around my finger. "I love it," I breathed.

"Thanks. Take your clothes off."

"I love it beyond belief."

"Appreciate the enthusiasm for my new 'do, but that's not what the invitation to get naked is about. It's about . . . well, I just want to. I've been thinking more about change, and I'm sick of waiting for normal to happen. If my life is going to be about vampires, and werewolves, and maenads, and just plain crazy people, then fine. That's what it's about and I'll live with that, and deal with it, and have fun with it when possible. And I'll give you this, Franklin, you're a whole lot of fun naked."

She grabbed me by a belt loop on my jeans and started walking to the bedroom.

"Besides," she said over her shoulder, "you aren't the only one who knows how to fuck without moving."

An hour later I groaned deeply and shuddered all over as an orgasm fried my senses for several long moments. Tara moaned in agreement above me, then gave me a delightfully smug look.

"Told you so," she said.

"So you did," I acknowledged, and pulled her down into my arms. "We'll be doing this again, quite soon? I might have missed some of the delicate nuances of your technique."

"After I get some sleep," she murmured, snuggling up to me and using my chest as a pillow. "I'm beat."

"You can have the bed to yourself in awhile, I'm meeting the new client again tonight. Do you mind if I catch up on the news first?"

"Mmmm," she said, eyes barely open.

I clicked on the TV and watched the local newscaster run through the day's usual murder, mayhem and idiocy, perking up a bit when he got to the latest on the Vampire Rights Amendment. The last thing I was expecting to see was the newscaster interrupted by his sudden, violent death.

"_Does that help you decide, America? DO NOT TURN OFF THE CAMERA! "_

"_Shit_!", I yelled, my obscenity echoed by Tara's sudden "The _fuck_!"

We both sat up in bed, staring at the screen as Edgington effectively destroyed the vampire civil rights movement in America, if not on the planet.

"That's your boss? Your _maker_?" Tara asked.

"That's him, and he's gone completely insane. Someone must have staked Talbot, that's the only thing that could make him go this mad, this quickly."

I leapt out of bed and went to the living room, where my hidden safe was. Whatever happened next, I would need a lot of money. As I was stuffing banded bills and various check books into an overnight bag, my cell phone beeped with a text message. Russell, of course.

"He's sending me a time and place for a rendezvous," I told Tara, who'd come to stand in the doorway.

"What are you going to do, Franklin?"

"I'm not getting into the middle of a human/vampire war, if that's what you're asking," I told her as I tapped out a swift reply to my maker. "Hey, Tara, watch how fast I can type 'motherfucker'."

"That's amazing," she agreed. "Need any help packing?"

I shook my head. "All I'm taking is the money. Once we're dressed, we're out of here."

"What about your new client?"

"I'll call her when we're on the road. Considering she's human, it's likely I no longer have a new client."

I took back roads and old highways as much as I could, places were I could drive with the headlights off and not attract the attention of the law. I wasn't too worried about Russell coming after me, between whoever was gunning for him and the Vampire Authority he didn't have any time to spare searching for me, but it still paid to be cautious. Ancient sentiment made me hope his unknown enemy finished Russell off quickly; the Authority would degrade him as well as kill him, to convince the frightened human majority that they were serious about policing and punishing their fellow undead. I had no desire to see Nan Flanagan make Russell's fangs into earrings to wear as she danced at his execution.

I reached over and touched Tara on the shoulder. "I was thinking, when we find a town that badly needs a bookstore, we could buy a fixer-upper to convert into a downstairs store with upstairs living quarters. Do the repairs and alterations ourselves, save some money for more books. You don't mind my hanging around, do you?"

"I don't mind. I kinda like you," she admitted, not too grudgingly. "But wouldn't it be safer for you to keep moving while Edgington's still on the loose?"

"Maybe, but he's going to have his hands full with bigger problems than my rebellion. Besides, I'm in love with you."

"Oh, Jesus, Franklin." She rolled her eyes in annoyance.

"I know, it's too soon. Believe me, I've been trying to find some other, less serious, word to describe my feelings: infatuated, enchanted, charmed, thunderstruck, gob-smacked, besotted, smitten. They're all true enough, but the one that's most true is still "in love". I'm in love with your courage, your strength, your vulnerability. In love with your loyalty, your generosity, your devotion, with your anger and your ferocity and your pain and your honesty. I'm in love with you, Tara. Look, I'm not going to turn into a stalker, or get weird and pushy, but I would like to have a chance to win your heart."

"Now I feel a little like an asshole for saying just 'I kinda like you.'"

I grinned at her. "But you meant that, right? You do kinda like me?"

"Yeah, I do," she grinned back at me.

"I'm happy to start there." And we drove on through the night together.

Fini


End file.
